


The Eighth Sin: Ignorance

by DragonQueenTessa



Category: Five Nights at Freddy's
Genre: Child Death, Demons, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Entomophobia, Gaslighting, Gen, Gore, Hell, I swear to god Funko please just release more Spring Bonnie plushies, Phobias, Temporary Character Death, William isn't a friendly fellow, past child loss
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-04-27
Updated: 2020-04-29
Packaged: 2021-03-01 23:21:18
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,152
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23875372
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DragonQueenTessa/pseuds/DragonQueenTessa
Summary: When death came for him, Henry Emily quietly dared to hope that he would be greeted by the Pearly Gates and get to tread into a quiet Afterlife, together with his dear daughter and all the other innocent souls.Unfortunately for him, his belated involvement allowed for a host of further suffering decades in the past, and he has sins to pay for. Evil from inaction still counts.(HenryHell AU/HC inspired by r/ImsorryJon and r/ImsorryAfton)
Relationships: William Afton | Dave Miller & Henry Emily
Comments: 14
Kudos: 45





	1. Reap what you sow

When the agony of flame licking at his bones fell away into a quiet emptiness, he kept his eyes pinched shut a while longer. His life had been such a tragedy before, there could so easily be more to come...

When the new silence endured after all, his curiosity eventually won out over fear. His sight needed a moment to adjust to the poor lighting, but gradually some colours came into view. The alternating black-and-white tiling on the walls on either side of him, lined on top and below with a rich red was first to draw his eye. A simplistic colour scheme, and so sickly familiar. Unmarked boxes were strewn around the tiled floor as far as he could see down the hallway, accompanied by metallic objects he couldn't quite identify.

Confetti lay scattered on the ground below him. Clearly, he was in some kind of a restaurant. Pushing to his feet, he scrutinized his immediate surroundings. The walls here were like those at Freddy's, the _first_ one, the location where _she-_

__

He almost winces at the guilt that pounces upon him. So long ago, but such a raw wound even now. He couldn't save her. Why was he back at the restaurant? Was this a dream?

No, he knew he was dead, the fire of the fake pizzeria had indiscriminately claimed them all. Him, his single employee and those four masked horrors. The dead couldn’t dream, or so he hoped. Where there were dreams, nightmares could come to life, too.

A sudden thought struck him. _If not a dream or an echo of the past, was this a chance at a do-over?_

He turned away from the wall to face the open corridor, poorly-lit but offering a traversable path. He had to find a way outside, maybe _she_ would be waiting for him there. Knowing now what he didn't then, he understood time was of the essence. Murderers preferred to avoid an audience.

He started jogging down the hall, not wanting to break into a full run unless he learned it was necessary. In the brief uptime of his jogging gait, a small tremor raced through the floor. He didn't feel it as he moved, but he heard the paper pals tacked to the walls shuffle. He paused briefly, but nothing more came. Odd. He could swear he saw and heard them move. What was that all about?

He reached the end of the hallway, the wooden door ominously guarded by Bonnie - or, well, what was left of him. His confusion caused him to pause, despite himself.

 _How could they do this to you?_ Was what he had asked himself the first time he'd lain eyes on the horror attraction prop. The Bonnie stand had been the talk of the week when he'd worked there… Of course, the week _after_ he’d left Fazbear's Fright would mark the acquisition of the _real_ conversation piece. The paper seven days after his last shift there had spelled the drama out for him to read with breakfast.

## It burns!

 _Fazbear's Fright burns to the ground._

__

#### _A new local attraction based on an ancient pizzeria chain burned down overnight._

  


He didn't remember the full article, but he could still vividly see the last line in his mind's eye:

__

####  _"The few items that were salvaged will be sold at public auction."_

Much to his regret, he hadn't gone out to see the public auction until the last day. When he discovered him there, some eccentric collectors had already fought their bidding war. Who in their right minds would pay thousands upon thousands for a horribly rotten, fire-damaged animatronic? The winning bidder had to have a lot of fond memories about Fredbear's, with how excitedly he watched the man in question secure the morbid thing to a transport bed.

"I checked the tags, it really is a real one." The old man had boasted to his assistant. "These were discontinued back in the late eighties, when I brought my kids there! It's a museum piece for sure. Look, it might be missing half an arm, but on the other one the fingers still articulate! Do you think we should restore the limbs, or leave it as is?"

He hadn't stuck around to hear the rest, another ignorant mistake.

 _Springtrap_ , as the attraction had morbidly dubbed him, had arrived in some newbie's first official week on the job. The staff must have been aware of the dark track record of springlock suits to come up with that nickname, but somehow the idiots either missed, or completely glossed over the fact that the fucking thing _still had the remains of its’ final victim inside._ Henry Emily hadn't seen the monster shamble, or else he would have surely realized its' sentience... and murderous intent. If only he could have been the one in the security office that week, instead of the young employee who sadly lost his life, then he would have known right then and there who he was dealing with.

William.

 _Some reunion that would have been_ , he thought.

After a few months of research into the company that had once been under _their_ names, he had dredged up enough information from the secretive Fazbear Entertainment to confirm the worst. It wasn't some random unfortunate employee in that suit; it had to be Will. The timeframe just lined up too well. As far as Henry had dug, no death report had ever been filed for the last incident - there was no trace of springlock accident records right before the place closed its' doors - and clearly no-one had been around to help peel a body out of the springlocks, or even notice another person going missing at the location in the first place.

Like most of the other Aftons, William had disappeared as if by magic at some point, only this time Henry had a rough idea of _when_ the guy completely dropped off the face of the Earth.

Only he would have known where that horrendous suit was stored in the dilapidated, condemned restaurant. He had been one of the most avid costume entertainers in the company. He stayed on as an employee even after starting up Afton Robotics with his sights set on projects much bigger than Freddy's, though this venture noticeably strained his business relationship with Henry, at the veiled threat of becoming competition if Henry dared to fire him.

The firing did come eventually, though. When the majority of their team lost trust in William in the midst of another media frenzy, Henry had to go along with the vote.

He didn’t want to believe that William - his _friend_ \- could be involved in this whole missing-children mess, and so he just _hadn’t_ , not until the truth had stared him in the face. He’d foolishly given the man the benefit of the doubt many times, and innocents had come to pay dearly for it...

Thirty years. For thirty _fucking years_ the bastard had been in there, just _waiting._ Henry could have found him himself and ended this in a neater way back in the nineties, but _no_ , he had felt too sad to want to deal with Freddy's again after selling off the brand. And when some clueless looters did finally find the old suit in the year 2023, they had no idea what they had set loose.

Henry couldn’t say who the bigger idiots were here - those reckless teens fueled by whispers of Freddy’s dark past, or _himself._

_Wow,_ that was a mental tangent. Shoving away the bad memories, Henry regarded the Bonnie stand once more, looking it in its' one lit-up eye before proceeding through the door.

 _Why was the Fazbear's Fright prop here in what looked to be Freddy's?_ He didn't have time to think on that when he entered the room. Evidently, this was a show stage and dining room, tables lined up in the center and colourful chairs haphazardly set up in front of the wooden platform. Party hats still sat on the tables, and streamers cascaded from Fredbear banners hung up throughout the space. It was a perfect imitation of the real deal, except for one.

As Henry closed in, the purple show stage curtains pulled back to reveal the mascots. Where it should have been Fredbear and his companion, the ursine spring-matronic was conspicuously absent. In his place stood the golden horror himself, Fuzzhare. Once upon a time, Henry had thought fondly about these two. Fredbear's was _his_ brainchild, and he had joined forces with William to make the magic _real._

He had not been as crazy about Fredbear as Will had been about Fuzzhare, but the two mascots were certainly intended as a sort of parallel between himself and his best friend.

He gritted his teeth and continued past the show stage, shuffling between the mass of colourful plastic chairs. Against his better judgement he looked back, and what he saw unnerved him deeply: Fuzzhare was _looking at him_ , as if meaning to taunt him. Those big, bright green eyes would never do to anyone else what they did to Henry, but that was because only he knew the _truth._

Flying into a rage and forgetting his real objective, he grabbed the nearest portable light installation and, with strength born from his fury, charged up to the foot of the show stage to thrust the equipment at the hare mascot. The metal ends of the light pole shot through the thin fur layer and impaled themselves between parts of the engaged endoskeleton, the clashing of metal against metal making Henry wince. His anger immediately leaving him, he was content to just watch the golden creature tip over backwards and crash satisfyingly upon the stage, damaging not just the impact site but itself with its' own weight.

He wanted to say something to the thing. A _'That's what you get!'_ or _'Wish I'd done this back then!'_ , but his lips remained sealed. The words would feel limp, coming from an old, foolish deadman lashing out at a spooky suit. Fuzzhare had never been sentient, not without William. The machine wasn't the one to blame for this.

In the void of his silence, he heard something creak. Just as he began to turn around, a low voice drifted past.

"How rude…" The words admonished. "What did poor old Fuzzy ever do to you?"

 _He knew that voice._ It was coarse and a little breathy, like the hiss of a snake, but that's exactly how his last memories of it sounded, too. He could feel the hairs on the back of his neck lifting.

"Where are you?" He demanded from the disembodied voice. "Where am _I?_ "

"I am everywhere you look." The entity rumbled ominously. Okay, that was only about the most terrifying answer Henry could have possibly gotten, fantastic. "And my dear friend," It went on, chuckling under its’ breath. "-where else would you be other than _Hell?_ "

Fear settled lowly in Henry's gut. _Hell?_ This didn't look like Hell…

. 

He heard a rough sound to his right, like the scuttling of too many metal legs. The only animatronic he imagined could _possibly_ make such a sound would be that messed-up white Foxy he had seen photographs of, the one that bit some unlucky employee in 1987. But ‘the Mangle’ was said to like climbing, avoiding the ground when it could. This new horror sounded too… _big_ for that.

"Oh Henry~" William's battered voice crooned from the darkness. "Don't be scared, isn't it good to be among old friends?"

Henry moved to go pick up a chair to use for self-defense, but once bent down to grab one, he found it would not budge.

"Oh dearest Henry," The voice taunted. "Don't you know you couldn't _possibly_ lift that? It's weighed down with your shame. They all are. Don't worry though, you'll see some familiar faces if you just dare yourself to meet them."

So long as it meant William stayed wherever he was, in the shadows, Henry was willing to listen. He tried once more to shift the chair, but it was as if it were bolted to the floor. He couldn't lie to himself either, he saw that little pair of legs materialize beside the chair legs, right on cue as the demon pointed out his shame.

Trailing his eyes slowly up those slender, pale legs, he saw the frill of her favourite ruffle skirt. Elizabeth had always adored the colour pink, a gentler dilution of her father's taste for royal purple. His eyes wandered higher and there she was, sat up straight and regarding him with her bright, inquisitive eyes, green like Fuzzhare’s. He almost smiled at the girl, before remembering with horror that this was all _fake_ , it just had to be. This wasn't a real Fredbear's, or Freddy's, or Fazbear's Fright.

Poor Lizzie had been dead for _decades_ now, and her soul _should_ have moved on after the fire... But this was Hell, apparently, and the horrifying idea of innocent spirits being stuck to _him_ for his mistakes in life sure made that feel all the more believable.

. 

"Look at them," William's voice urged, impatience leaking into the words like a viper's poison into helpless prey. Henry listened, and moved his sight from Elizabeth to the other chairs, each now occupied by another… another mute child, some of whom he recognized, others he did not…Three, five, ten… _more._

By the end of his rough count, there had to be at least _twenty_ ghostly children here, not one looking any older than ten years of age.

Were the children always here, from the moment he first moved into this room? He could swear the chairs had been empty before.

"How nice of me to gather them all together, hm?" The monster's voice inquired, terrifyingly enough sounding much closer than before. _"In one place…"_

Then, to his absolute horror, the scuttling closed in. Henry threw himself to the floor in between the speechless children, afraid of what was approaching. He pinched his eyes shut tight, knowing it was all over.

"Look at me, old friend," William demanded. "Look at me and see what _you_ helped me to become."

From the sound of wood creaking, Henry could surmise that William had crawled his way onto the stage. This wasn't like one of those cheesy horror movies where the monster was close enough for the protagonist to feel its' breath, so the beast had to still be at some distance from himself.

. 

He cracked one eye open just barely, but realized far too late what a mistake it was to give Will even one inch. _'Give him an inch, he'll take the world'_ , a deeply depressed Michael had muttered as much to his defacto second guardian once.

Henry's eyes didn't belong to him anymore. No matter how hard he tried, he could not close them or even look away. He couldn't look at anything but the horrid beast perched on the old stage before him.

Too many legs, _way too many legs…_ and a long, segmented body that trailed behind the masked villain, the form so long that it couldn't fit on the stage in its' entirety.

Henry's eyes watered with fear at the triggering sight, and William barked out a spireful laugh in response. It was such a harsh sound, malicious and confident. The beaten-up body of what was once the beloved Fuzzhare mascot was further segmented, what used to be the hare's tummy hollowed out to make room for four more pairs of awful insectoid legs.

Higher up, two pairs of arms that ended in spindly-fingered hands unfolded and opened wide, the demon gleefully showcasing his new look to his helpless victim. Yet further above the torso sat a set of what looked vaguely like shoulder pads, and protruding from them was a slightly less alien sight: the damaged right arm of William's final suit-and-corpse self, and the bony spike of what remained of his left, both extremities stuck at odd angles and seeming aglow with embers. A long 'neck' of wires carried the head, which while also recognizable, of course wasn't a nice sight to see. The monster's metal teeth had become sharp points, and the eyeholes of the mask were now black and vacant but for two golden points of light, glinting maliciously at Henry.

"Isn't it nice to be reunited here?" William growled. "I planned this whole show just for you Henry, and for _her…"_

And then he saw it, because who else would it be sat dead center in front of the stage ahead of him, but his own precious daughter?

 _"Charlie!"_ He cried, but it was as if she didn't hear a thing.

"Oh, forgive her, she is a little conflicted," William cooed, his insect-animatronic hybrid body beginning to move, the eight stomach-legs reaching to the ground as he slinked down to floor-level from the front face of the stage. "Her daddy _did_ leave her behind for an awful long time. All alone, in the dark..." The monster reminded. "-No daddy, no friends… well, I solved the latter problem for her. I gave her _so many friends."_

"Your victims…" Henry whimpered, shuffling back as the monster approached, but halting when he saw him bee-line for Charlie instead. "Stay away from her!" He shouted, not even acknowledging the fact that he was grossly outmatched in every sense. Feeling William's immediate indignation even as the mascot head's withered smirk remained permanently etched into its’ golden visage, Henry set one foot back, ready to bolt.

With a truly terrifying amount of speed William suddenly charged him, effortlessly throwing aside the same chairs Henry couldn't make budge, and with them the lost children too. The demon cackled and eight pointy bug limbs closed tightly around Henry's middle, far too fast for him to dodge. He screamed and tried to push away, but William easily reversed back onto the stage with his prey in his clutches.

"Shhhhh, my old friend, I just want to talk…" He cooed almost gently into the man’s ear, poison dripping off his words. Henry was utterly panicked, but with no way out he had no option but to settle back down and endure this. Looking back down at where the chairs used to be, only Charlie remained seated, her chair as undisturbed as her vacant stare.

"She was so alone…" William somberly spoke. He clutched Henry tighter in his centipede limbs, harshly. "Really, I couldn't care _less."_ The serial killer dryly stated, immediately reminding Henry that his captor had no conscience, no goodwill. "-But at least I _did_ something about it. An inconvenient consequence of inviting multiple ghosts into one building is that they can get to know one another, communicate, coordinate... She was their leader, you know? Not content to sit on her arse and _feel sorry for herself_ , unlike her ignorant father."

Henry bared his teeth at the abomination holding him. "I already knew I left her behind! I just didn't KNOW anything at the time!” He lashed out, fear fuelling his anger more. “I had no idea she was there- _You're_ the one behind all this- This should be Hell for you too, and you CANNOT go accusing ME-"

William's maw flooded with hellfire then, and Henry averted his face lest it be scorched. _"Yes, I was behind the slaughters,"_ The animal proudly retorted, his voice warped and distorted but still unmistakably his. "-but this isn't _our_ Hell dear Henry,"

He turned the prey around in his grasp and pulled his old friend up to eye level then, chuckling malevolently. "It was made _just for you."_

The chairs and children melted away into nothing, the floor bled red, and Henry _screamed._


	2. Orientation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Death is not the end of all things in this realm, as Henry soon finds out.
> 
> As confusing as this labyrinth of halls and rooms is, he pushes onwards, just hoping he stands a chance of making sense of it all.
> 
> An encounter with a familiar Puppet and an ominous tale teach him that he should ideally exersise caution around _all_ masked faces.

He was sure that the pain lighting up all through his body had to mean certain death… and while he was right in a way, his demise evidently wasn't so permanent this time.

Henry had woken from his fatal encounter in a room he didn't recognize. Taking traits from multiple early and later Freddy's locations, he couldn't make sense of the place. A poster of the original Freddy, with posters of the Toy versions of Bonnie and Chica at either side of him…

He didn't have all that much time to dwell on his surroundings though. All of a sudden, he became very keenly aware of how his body was shuddering, still slumped halfway to the floor, though it was uninjured now. His subconscious had tried very hard to tuck away the memories of William's attack, but it wasn't enough. Like a flood upon the breaking of a dam, the event hit him all at once.

It hadn't been a swift death… good God, William had snatched him up with such ease, Henry had been utterly powerless to stop him. One of those gross insect legs had prodded at his stomach for just a moment, after which that monster had… _fuck_ , he'd driven that pointy limb effortlessly into Henry's weak human guts, like a hot knife through butter. Right in between the bones, the clothes on his body posing no obstacle at all.

Of course he'd know exactly where to aim a sharp object… Partly thanks to Henry's stupidity, Will had been free to become a fully-fledged serial killer, sickeningly adept at the craft.

Henry hadn't been able to hear the bastard's voice over the sound of his own screams as more of those centipede legs had speared into his flesh, but along with the brutal memory he could actually hear and comprehend William's voice now, as if they had been uploaded straight into his head after the fact.

 _"We'll have so much fun together, you and I…"_ The monster had purred, all the while calmly guiding a mass of torn intestine out of the gash a few of the legs had made in the human's stomach. Henry remembered dry-heaving at the first awful, wet splat his innards made hitting the stage below him.

_"Indulge me once again, won't you dear Henry? It'll be much_ **easier** _for you if you simply give up trying to stop me. Just like old times…"_

The agony had remained for a while, but seemingly at the same time at which Henry's throat finally died, William had lost the urge to speak. Instead, the wicked creature had quietly continued tugging bits of organ and flesh from his limp prey, content to let gravity take care of each piece once it was extracted. William had always been a little fascinated by the morbid, and there wasn't a doubt in Emily's mind that the demon found picking apart his prey to be a soothing act.

Once the pain drifted off into the nothing, Henry did too.

.

And now he was here, pathetic and trembling. Pushing himself up a little straighter, his arms almost gave out as he abruptly dry-heaved again. His stomach was empty and he'd have nothing more to vomit out than stomach acids, but even they didn't come up. He held in place for a moment longer, trying to force back the recollections.

Eventually, his body stopped shaking, and he craned his head around to take a second look at his surroundings. Part of him honestly expected the room to have changed in the meantime, and he breathed a quick sigh of relief upon finding it was still the same, as mismatched as that was.

One point in his favor. He dared to hope that once he entered a room, it wouldn't suddenly change on him later. Maybe, if he was right, navigation would be possible.

Using an overturned wood stool to help him stand up, he scanned the room in greater detail. Decently well-lit, unlike that stage room he'd died in, and with two sets of tables lined with chairs and more of the same stools. There was no stage to be seen here, but up ahead Henry could see a multitude of doors. Looking behind him, he found another unmarked door at his back. Was that where he'd come from?

Figuring he should check the nearest option first, he turned the handle to gain entry. The door seemed relatively well-kept, easing open without a sound. 

He peeked around the corner, wary. This door opened up into another hallway, one which certainly looked a whole deal less inviting than where he currently was. Shutting the door as quietly as he could, and only opening it up again just enough to quickly peep and check if it was still the same, he finally left it closed with a sigh.

Okay, the hallway hadn't changed after he closed the door. He'd have to remember to check later to see if it wasn't some timed thing… Speaking of time, how the hell was that meant to work? He had yet to find a clock.

Deciding to leave that issue for later, Emily moved to one of the unexplored doors further up ahead. The two adjacent doors were the same, simple wood slabs, but the third, on the opposite wall, looked to be coated by a layer of tarnished metal. A bizarre choice, something probably not meant to be attached to a dining room… but then, this was nowhere near a logical world. Deciding to leave the metal door for last, he moved to the nearest unremarkable door.

Repeating his checking pattern from the hallway door, he found a tiny side room with an extra dining table. A quiet room for especially young kids and their parents? It looked messy, and Henry could see a layer of dust settled on the table.

Of course, there wasn't going to be anybody looking after this disguised hellscape. Since it was clear nothing had seemingly ever disturbed anything in this room, he filed it away as a possible hiding place. In case… _things_ chased him here. Maybe even Will would miss it?

 _Highly unlikely,_ Henry chastised himself.

.

Letting the door of the dusty room slip shut, he turned to the second simple door. He cringed internally when it opened with a lengthy creak, and he dared not open it wide in case the noise had drawn any attention.

He noticed something new down this Fredbear-styled hallway. Drifting along the corridor were the soft tones of a music box rendition of "My Grandfather's Clock".

The only thing associated with that melody was the Marionette…

Against his better judgement, he decided to go explore it. Sneaking cautiously down the hall, passing another door and conscious of the dark corners ahead, he eventually found it.

The Puppet's gift box, playing its' song, and a small prize counter. The two shelves were stocked with a multitude of plushies and then some of those cheap, low-quality, plastic fair toys. Looking at the plush toys, he found again a mis-mash of different locations in the form of a messy stock of mascots. A Toy Bonnie, original Chica, a _Fredbear_ and a multitude of the reworked original Freddys. 

Huh. Fredbear's had not even produced mascot merch until the last moment, a few short weeks before the springlock duo would wind up abruptly being sent to retirement from the stage, in favor of the new group. Fredbear and especially Fuzzhare plushies were incredibly rare even right after launch, and Henry honestly preferred it that way. There was never another order put in for them, and Fredbear Diner only suffered minor complaints for it. No later location would ever get to carry Fredbear merch, either.

Henry had given his own set away after Carson's-

Deciding not to tempt fate by walking around with a Fredbear plushie, he picked up one of the regular Freddys instead. He didn't know why he even bothered with the plushies, but it was… nice, having something soft to hold. If nothing else, a tablecloth and this Freddy could serve as a crappy bedsheet and uncomfortable pillow combo.

Would he even need sleep? The soothing notes of the music box suggested he would, his mind growing a little fuzzy at the looping pattern.

That was, until the music abruptly stopped, and another melody kicked in. _"Pop! Goes the Weasel"_ started up behind his back, and although Henry didn't know what that _meant_ , he decided he didn't wish to find out.

Hurrying back and passing up the untested door in the Fredbear hallway, he headed for the dining room he had mostly explored. He didn't want to be reckless about opening doors, even in a rush.

As the melody of the music box was muffled by the wooden door, Emily sighed softly. Time to face the metal door, huh?

Peeping through the keyhole, he found he couldn't see diddly. Great, so he'd have to open it up.

Grasping the doorlatch and operating it, he pulled the door to him to reveal… A Toy Freddy animatronic, deactivated in what looked like a back room.

Huh, so this place had not just dining rooms and prize corners, but creepy back rooms too. Great.

He was about to go looking around for anything useful at all, when the sound of Pop! Goes the Weasel suddenly announced itself again… Had the Puppet come after him?!

Turning to face the (mysteriously opened) door, he was just a hair too late to dodge out of the way of two long, grasping arms, wrapping tightly around his middle. __"Charlie!"__ He yelled, shaking his head as he tried to fight the Marionette. "Charlie- Charlotte, it's me! It's your papa!"

The white mask of the Puppet jumped forward as if meeting his gaze, but it didn't seem phased for even a second, not so much as acknowledging Henry but for the decision to coil one arm around his neck and mouth to silence him.

Try as he might, he couldn't get a good enough grip on his flimsy attacker to pull it away to run or even so much as _breathe._ Eventually, he grew too disoriented to even try anymore. The Marionette's form seemed to grow as his world faded into black silence.

A gentle British voice cut through the quiet, though Henry had no capacity to respond. _"Oh, what a shame."_ The voice murmured. _"Maybe it would be in your best interest not to ignore her next time."_

Then, nothing.

.

Another death, another new room… Henry would really like to avoid that becoming a regular occurrence. This time, he woke up feeling relatively fine. No shakes, just some gooseflesh at the memory of William's voice. Don't ignore the Puppet when you come across it… okay, fair advice.

Taking stock of his surroundings, he found he'd landed in a corridor reminiscent of the Fright. Poorly-lit, fake dirt and grime slathered everywhere, junk littering the floor… a genuine second-rate horror experience, alright.

Like Fredbear's and the first Freddy's, Fazbear's Fright was a floorplan he was familiar with. He half hoped he'd be able to recognize some pattern, but he guessed it was just going to be random rooms again.

No sense in waiting, Will could very well be hoping for him to just give up already. Henry had a little more pride than that; he wouldn't just hand the bastard the win on a silver platter.

To his surprise, he found the Freddy plush on the floor next to him. He totally expected to have lost that after dropping it in the attack, but sure enough, here it was. Picking it up, he swore he could hear a whisper travel through the room, but he didn't see anything that could have made the noise.

Getting to his feet, he felt a sudden stab of something in his stomach. It wasn't quite pain, but certainly a discomfort: hunger.

Fantastic. His body decided that the perfect time to be hungry was when he had just _left_ a pizza place. Hell, there was no guarantee that there was even food to be found in this colourful Hell. Maybe starvation was just another ticking time bomb he'd have to deal with time and time again. Grumbling to himself, he started walking. The floor ahead was a weird mess, a toss-up of the Fright's normal floors and wooden planks, like the flooring from Fredbear's. Henry had to watch his step, but he made it past the weird part and back onto even ground. He came to a stop at the sight of four doors and an open passage.

Deciding to check the open doorway first as a precaution, he found that it was nothing more than a T-junction leading to two more corridors. He could probably find paths to infinitely winding hallways, if he just kept going down them… but his curiosity kept him here.

Door number one… wooden, painted black, lacquer chipped in places but otherwise intact. Working the handle, Henry pushed it open, finding another hall on the other side, themed in the colour scheme of a Freddy's, but still as messy as where he currently was. Lovely. Heaving a sigh, he moved on to door two, on the same wall. A storage room.

The empty classic Bonnie head on the table gave him the shivers, and he carefully drew the door closed again, worried that he could wake something if he wasn't quiet.

That just left doors three and four. He hoped at least one of these would be worth his time…

Door three took a bit of doing to open, but leaning into the push helped. The floor here was filthy, making the underside of the door catch on bits of trash, hence the trouble. Squinting into the dark, Henry suddenly yelped, and hurriedly pulled the door closed again.

There, in the pitch black, had been a pair of golden pin-pricks of light, looking back at him. Breathing heavily, Emily decided that he couldn't waste time. Peeking quickly past the fourth door, he found another hall. Should he take this one in the hope the monster assumed he'd run the other way? Or would Will bust through the wall if he passed him?!

He ran down the hallway belonging to the first door, praying that the centipede monstrosity would go for the T-junction instead.

.

Henry didn't know how long he ran for, the Freddy plush clutched tightly in his arm as he panted. Eventually too breathless to continue, he stopped in another dining room, this one actually very well-illuminated for a change. The perfect lighting was such a surprise that the brightness of it almost hurt his eyes. There was a small stage here, but he didn't feel as worried when the curtain pulled back to reveal Mr. Hippo. He knew that the Mediocre Melodies were safe to be around (all except maybe Neddbear, but every group needed their oddball), and so he seated himself at a table in front of the stage, just to catch his breath.

Mr. Hippo was active, and as Henry worked on beating back his nerves, the animatronic began to speak.

_"How wonderful to have you all here. Do you youngsters want to hear a story?"_

_You all?_ Henry squinted and looked around, but sure enough - there they were, a multitude of the childrens' spirits, hard to see in the light but definitely present. Elizabeth was sitting just two chairs away, and next to her were Fritz and another young boy Henry had only learned about after his death, a four-year old named Tommy. _Only four years old…_ A few chairs away, on the other end of the table, sat Gabriel, all alone. The children looked at Mr. Hippo expectantly, and sure enough the animatronic storyteller started to speak.

_"This is the story of a young boy who made friends with a bat, a very hungry bat…"_

_Thanks for reminding me of my empty stomach, sport,_ Henry thought. Well, if this room was safe - it looked to be - then he could stand to explore it. Moving to the second table, he spotted one more seated spirit - Suzie, who he found had died alone too - and in front of her a half-eaten pizza and some colouring stuff, consisting of a thin stack of paper and some felt-tip pens.

"Uh- Hi, Suzie…" Henry prompted, but she only looked at him quietly. "I- Listen, I'm starving, could I maybe have a slice of your pizza there? I would be really thankful..."

He was pretty sure spirits didn't need to eat, but he didn't want to be a dick. It took a fair bit of patience, but eventually, the young girl did nod. So it wasn't just Lizzie who could see him, and communication _was_ possible. That reassured him, just the slightest bit. Taking a slice of pizza with a quick _thank you,_ he sat back down closer to her, half listening to Mr. Hippo prattle on.

_"...And he told all his friends not to chase the bat away, it just wanted to eat a little bit…"_

.

The slice of pizza was fine, it took the edge off, but really he wanted to have the entire thing. He felt his ears burning with embarrassment as he asked her again, but this time she gave a more sure nod, apparently not bothered that the remaining half of her pizza would go to someone else. He thanked her, and pulled the paper pizza plate his way, making sure that his stomach would think it was fuller than he was really getting it by eating slower.

_"...He didn't know where Missy's pet bird had gone. The bat played with the bird sometimes, but they were good friends. The boy knew they were…"_

After finishing the three slices, Henry wiped the little bit of sauce off with a Freddy's-branded paper napkin. Taking one pen and just one sheet of paper, he waited for another nod from Suzie before he actually used either. When she agreed, he started to draw.

He would have liked to draw with her or the other kids, but his mind was elsewhere. Instead of cheerful shapes and robot friends, he drew rooms and hallways, trying his best to recall what places he had run through in his efforts to escape Will.

His flight had been easy and relatively unimpeded, apart from a few obstacles provided by the environment. He briefly wondered if William had actually given chase, never mind _been_ there at all. Deciding it was too early for him to be going mad just yet, he chose to believe it was real, and that running had been a wise choice.

_"That morning, Timmy's rat Chipper was nowhere to be found…"_

Henry had mostly run through hallways, just as he predicted he would, but there were some notable rooms. Once, he had to get through a kitchen, one accented with the wood panelling and purple banners of the Fredbear's kitchen, but nothing like the real layout had been in life. It was considerably bigger than the real deal, but passage through had been pretty easy. Now that he knew food existed here, maybe it was worth heading back to scrounge around.

_"They searched all day, but when Missy herself went missing, too, all the other kids went home scared…"_

.

He'd found a dead end on the other side of one of the doors leading out of the kitchen, which had been just _great._ He wanted to try the third door, so he had to backtrack through part of the kitchen, which he did in a hurry. From there, he rushed through further stretches of halls, dashing around corners and wearing himself out. He'd come across one more door on the way, but something had… whispered, cautioning him against it.

And so he had found his way here to this big room.

_"And so the bat stood there in that small room, now as tall as a man, well-fed and smiling down at the boy who had let him in, the boy who had let him play freely. The vampire bat spoke to him… 'Thanks for the feast, but now I must go.' And flew away that night, never to be seen again."_

Henry tried not to let the story bother him. But, Creepy tales were Candy Cadet's schtick, and Mr. Hippo had never been programmed with such morbid things.

It seemed nothing was truly sacred here. If it really was Will who held the strings in hand, which could very well be the case, how sure could Henry be around _any_ animatronic, even his own?

If the other Mediocre Melodies were weird, too, then Henry wasn't going to take his chances with any functioning animatronic, not unarmed. If the other older models were just as aggressive as the Puppet, then that meant a lot more risk. He'd have to explore extremely carefully...

Grabbing a few more sheets of paper, he folded them down the middle to create a book shape. Folding his crude map in the same manner, he stuck it between the blank sheets. A make-shift binder, safeguarding his map and providing opportunity for him to write a diary, or journal on the inside. Something with which to track his discoveries and progress…

Pocketing a few of the felt-tip pens, he stood. Regarding first Mr. Hippo's now-curtained stage and then the spirit children at the first table, his eyes were then drawn back to Suzie. Her gaze was still directed at Mr. Hippo's stage, but after a few seconds she tipped her little head up to look back at Henry.

As much as he didn't want to think about it, that caused him a momentary shiver. It was so odd, looking into the eyes of the dead. He had done it plenty with the animatronics, before and _after_ he knew they were haunted, but this was different. With the mechanical façade tethering the spirit to the living world peeled away, the dead were exposed. Somehow, Henry felt even more transparent, like they could read his every thought before it even reached his conscious brain.

.

He placed the Freddy plushie on the table, feeling some urge to… give the girl something in return for the food and drawing materials. When his hand let go of the plushie, though, he heard it again. That whisper.

And this time… he understood some of it.

_"Keep me… keep me, safer…"_

Suzie's eyes were fixed on the plushie, but the whispering ceased the minute her eyes settled back on Henry. Somehow, he figured out that the Freddy plush had spoken _for_ her.

The whispering back in the halls… had that been Suzie warning him? Had she guided him here? With a slightly uncertain nod, he rolled up his paper binder and picked the plushie back up.

"I'll keep it safe… and myself, too. Thank you…"

Suzie nodded, mute once more.

It was time to leave. He quickly took out his map to note this spot as a safe haven - at least for the time being - and then continued on his way, taking the right door at the back of the dining room. He didn't want to backtrack towards where he had last caught a glimpse of Will, just yet.


End file.
